To get the best price for your gold you will need to clean and dry it
before presenting it to a gold buyer. Gold buyers won’t accept it with
black sand or other debris in it. When you deliver your gold to a gold
merchant or any buyer who has a licence to buy gold (this may be a
jeweller), your gold will need to have an assay done to test it for
purity. The merchant then pays you according to the outcome of the assay
and the world gold price on the day of the assay. One gold buyer and
refiner in New Zealand is willing to take any amount of gold you want to
sell, whether it is half an ounce or 50 oz, large nuggets, small flakes,
or bright, fine gold.

Whoever you sell to ask what the buyer will put in your hand after the
assay has taken place, the purity establshed, the assay fee paid and the
buyer has deducted their fee. Some buyers can be cagey. Shop around.

It is easiest for the fossicker to sell to
jewellers. Usually there will be no assay charges, just a handling and
toll-call fee. In some cases this may amount to as much as $100. They
ring the refiner, Morris & Watson or Tennant, and get the current price,
then add their own handling fee. Many jewellers have to package your
gold and send it to the refiners; others may sell it through their shop
like the Gold Room in Hokitika, and the Gold Shop in Arrowtown. European
Jewellers in Christchurch will assay your gold for nothing, but charge a
fee if you want it refined, which they can do on the premises. Most
jewellers will give you a cash cheque on the spot.

European Jewellers 279 Hoon Hay Road Christchurch and the Akaroa wharf. Phone (03) 366 4567. This firm will assay and buy gold for
no fee and can refine gold for a fee.

The Gold Room Tancred Street, Hokitika. Phone
(03) 755 8362. The Gold Room will buy nuggets and gold and make
jewellery. No assay charges if the gold is local.

The Gold Shop 29 Buckingham Street, Arrowtown. Phone (03) 4421319 The
Gold Shop will buy gold and nuggets and make jewellery. No assay charges
if the gold is local.